Sunday, June 28, 2015

Going Home For A Couple Of Days And Other BS

We are leaving our wonderful lot in Gold Bar to go home to our hot, humid condo. We have some appointments that we must attend so we need to be home for a couple of days. I will miss the trailers working air conditioning and the parks swimming pool. We will return for the Fourth of July weekend as I have volunteered for a couple of stints at the gatehouse. I am looking forward to returning and we haven't even left yet. Having breakfast this morning at the clubhouse, then packing up and taking a quick swim before leaving to visit our son on the way home.

I am watching with great amusement the large pool of presidential candidates. You just can't make up some of this stuff that keeps popping up in the news. I am looking for someone with ideals and vision. Someone who will listen and not sit in the Oval Office and cut himself off from the people. A leader who wants people around him that are not just a bunch of yes men. I'm not seeing much, yet.

As we traveled the country we noticed the presence of the Confederate Flag in nearly every southern state that we visited. The flag supposedly represents the Confederate States of America and yet it was never ratified by the Confederate Congress, never flew over any Confederate Capitol and was never officially used by any Confederate groups during the Civil War. A square version of the flag was adopted by General Robert E. Lee for his Army of North Virginia and was called a battle flag. It became a symbol of the ancestry of the southern states of America and then the KKK resurrected it as their symbol of white supremacy along with the Nazi Swastika. Both of these are now viewed by many as symbols of the pain and anguish suffered before and during the Civil Rights era.

While the flag probably shouldn't fly on city, county or state property there can be no doubt that it should be protected under the First Amendment of the Constitution no matter how offensive it may be. It looks like we might be adding this flag and its derivatives to George Carlins "seven dirty words". I understand the need for restraint but I really wonder where this will lead. Then, again, maybe I am totally wrong.